听 At a recent discussion with new films minister Kim Howells, he seemed to believe that period drama was still the backbone of British cinema and that we should be making more contemporary films. It has clearly passed him by that young British directors have been mooning at costumes and clipped accents for some years now, delivering instead a never-ending stream of films about violent gangsters or young folk grappling with the modern world, and themselves. Still, whoever said that a films minister ought to actually watch any?
It's possible Mr Howells would retreat to the reassurance of Thomas Hardy or Jane Austen were he to sit through "The Truth Game". Blunt and in-your-face as the title implies, it is presumably designed by director Simon Rumley to stress the raw reality of the relationships between six 20-somethings who, despite being notionally friends, are at best edgy, at worst hostile towards each other as they sit around a table for dinner. They are all charmless, egotistical, or inadequate, united by their inability to be pleasant. As sex, drugs, and indecency begin to invade the conversation (dominated by Dan who both mocks the slightly simple Alan and specifies his desire for Alex), the (un)importance of truth to this shabby group is held up for inspection. While all the performances are impassioned and convincing, writer-director Simon Rumley (who also made "Strong Language", the first in this trilogy - there is one more to go) should have employed irony, wit, and shades of grey without losing his admirable sense of urgency. A plot would have distracted, but there isn't one.
"The Truth Game" is released at the on Friday 20th July 2001.
